Archive for Creative Juices News

January 7th marks the 30th Anniversary of the beginning of Creative Juices. It was the day my then partner, Max Parker, and I applied for our very first business license.

We started working out of my parents’ house in 1981. With a reconditioned Compugraphic typesetting machine and a drafting table we began. The customers trickled in and business took off.

Soon Creative Juices moved into a nearby storefront on Hawthorne Blvd. After a few years and growing pains, we moved to another storefront in downtown Torrance, in between a thrift store and a shoe repair shop. There was a Newberrys across the street and a tasty bakery down the block. They had really great tuna sandwiches and huge chocolate chip cookies.

Max soon left the juice factory to create Dogs of Design. We still worked together and moved into a new industrial park. Several moves and years later Creative Juices is now located in my own home office and Dogs moved to El Segundo.

The graphic design industry has changed quite a lot over the years. From typesetting and paste up to desktop publishing and the internet. In spite of all the ups and downs of recessions and the new online world of design, Creative Juices continues on. The future is online publishing, content creation and marketing. I look forward to many more years of learning and growing my business and yours. Check out more of the history of Creative Juices.

Starting today you can register a .co domain name.

This is known as a Top Level Domain (TLD) which started in South America but is now available worldwide.

The abbreviation .co can be interpreted as any number of things, from company, community, commerce or any other word you like that begins with “co” such as con.

Is this just another way of wasting your money?

True, some people think this is just another way of getting you to pay a premium amount of money to reserve yet another version of your domain to prevent others from getting it. While .com is the most popular choice, you also have .net, .org, .info and much more. How many people reserved a .mobi domain for mobile phones and now wonder why they bothered?

On the other hand, if you have a company name and cannot get a .com domain for it, now’s your chance to reserve a .co version. I’ve already registered creativejuices.co and cjuices.co. See if your domain name is available at my Creative Juices Domains website. And if you do reserve it there you’ll be contributing to the survival of Creative Juices since I am a GoDaddy registered reseller. Yay me.

How this plays out remains to be seen. Will search engines like this new domain extension? Will people get confused between .co and .com thinking it’s a misspelling and end up going to your competition by mistake? Do you want to take a chance and ignore this opportunity and let somebody else get your desired domain name… again?

If you’ve always wanted a well designed website platform that you can easily update yourself, WordPress.org is the answer.

“WordPress is a state-of-the-art publishing platform with a focus on aesthetics, web standards, and usability. WordPress is both free and priceless at the same time.” So says the WordPress website.

A self-hosted WordPress blog/website is the perfect format. It’s a content management system that’s easy to use and update. You have complete control of your site and can modify it whenever you want. Add pages, add posts, modify text. Create a photo gallery. And unlike WordPress.com, you can sell products and sign up for affiliate programs. And the best part is, it’s easy to understand. And don’t forget free.

“WordPress is infinitely extensible. One of the core philosophies of WordPress is to keep the core code as light and fast as possible but to provide a rich framework for the huge community to expand what WordPress can do, limited only by their imagination,” says the folks at WordPress.org.

A large variety of plugins add infinite versatility to your site. Just about anything you can think of can be added. It’s as simple as finding the plugin, installing it with a click of a button and dragging a widget to your sidebar.

Free Templates are Great. Your Own Unique Template is Better.

Here’s where Creative Juices comes in. While you can get quite a variety of free templates online, having your own unique header and theme, utilizing your logo, photos and artwork, adds a special touch.

A Creative Juices designed template adds class to your site. You’ll stand out because your site will be unlike any other.

Here’s a great opportunity to start your own self-hosted WordPress blog/website. Let the world know about your business or service. It’s fun to express yourself, share your expertise and maybe even make some money.

Special Offer from Creative Juices

For a limited time Creative Juices Design Studio is offering one year Free Hosting, set up and Domain Name Registration with your custom designed WordPress themed blog/website order*. This is an incredible opportunity to start your own blog/website with a creative look uniquely your own.

And remember, your self-hosted WordPress blog/website has a completely accessible back end that is easy to learn. You will be able to make changes, add an unlimited number of pages and install plugins with unbelievable functionality, all on your own. This includes photo galleries, PayPal shopping carts, Twitter and Facebook links, calendars, search engine optimization and tons more.

Search Engine Optimization and Site Registration are also available. Call for estimate.

Includes Title Tags, Meta Description, Keywords and Registration with major search engines like Google and Bing.

Call 310-791-5803 today and you can have a fully functional, completely customized website within a week.

Starting your own blog and/or website is a great hobby as well as a business tool. We make it creatively easy for you.

When you’re ready for something more, we can also design template-free websites from scratch.

Call for a quote. Because everyone’s needs are different we can’t list prices. Tell us your budget and we’ll tailor a program to fit your needs.

And of course, if you’re not interested in a hands on approach, we can do it all for you.

Hurry. You can’t afford to be without a visually appealing, highly functional website.

Today marks the 29th anniversary of Creative Juices. We have seen many changes in the graphic arts industry. We have lived through the days of typesetting, paste up, hand inking, negs and veloxes. Then came the Mac and desktop publishing. Remember Pagemaker? Then came e-mail, the World Wide Web, Quark, Adobe and AOL. Now we have Twitter, Facebook, WordPress, Joomla, Drupal and of course the iPhone.

As technology changes Creative Juices changes too. We have many new services, including designing WordPress templates, Twitter backdrops, search engine optimization, marketing and blog copywriting. Of course we still do logo designs, brochures, websites, ads and printing. Don’t forget we can also host your blog or website and set up your domain name. I am in the process of converting my website and blog into a WordPress format. I will be adding new and exciting features which I will soon introduce. Look for more updates here.

As always, we are dedicated to giving our clients personalized, one on one service and free advice on how to improve your business image and online presence.

Feel free to call any time or stop by and visit (appointment required). Lucy the Chihuahua is always eager to greet you. Keep up on her latest musings at AllMyChihuahuas.com.

I thank all my past, present and future clients for their patronage and friendship and look forward to working with you all again in 2010 and beyond.

“Diorama Fantasies is the brainchild of Joe Trujillo, a forty year veteran of portraits and figure building. He has developed his own form and style of miniature Dioramas: that of vivid images, details, and three dimensional scenery. His style which has been nourished by astute observation of all forms of art and his life long involvement with drawing and different forms of painting… Joe Trujillo’s award winning dioramas and art works have appeared in art shows and conventions such as Mad Model Party, Imagination Expos, New Jersey’s Chiller Theater, San Diego’s Comic-Con, 06/07/08 Wonder Fest, and most recently 09 Monsterpalooza, The Art of Monsters. Diorama Fantasies and Joe Trujillo are committed to providing both the hobbyist and the serious collectors with the best in original resin model kits and other pieces of art. With the main objective that art may be lived by all those who wish to savor it and should be made accessible by all, to experience its beauty.”

You can also check out some of our other exciting website designs. We offer quite a large, diverse collection. Having been in the graphics business since 1981 we were there at the start of the “World Wide Web” craze. Quite a difference from typesetting and pasting up forms to designing state of the art websites to be seen all over the world.